Exclusive Features

Artistic Finishes might have the soul of a craftsman, but it also embraces modern technology and innovative ideas to stay on top of its game.

The St. Paul, Minn.-based company creates custom floor moldings and accessories for the flooring professional. Its product line includes a variety of moldings, vents, treads and risers. While some products are stained by machines, the majority are still hand-stained by artisans.

“You have to have an artisan eye for color,” says Bill Treiber, technical sales and education manager. “We have many individuals staining one stick at a time. That’s virtually unheard of but that’s how we do business.”

Federal Brace develops brackets and other products based on the needs of its customers. By Jim Harris, Senior Editor at Knighthouse Media

Solving customer problems is deeply ingrained in Federal Brace’s DNA. “We were born out of providing solutions to customers who were unable to find solutions through normal means,” President Scott Toal says.

The company dates its origins back to the early 2000s when its parent company Short Run Pro, a custom metal fabricator, began offering support brackets for stone and granite countertops. “People were having trouble finding supports that would hold heavy countertop overhangs,” Toal says. “At the time, the conventional means of getting a suitable bracket made meant going to a manufacturer or fabricator, or going to a big box store and buying a bracket that would not have the aesthetic appearance or carrying capacity you’d want in a kitchen or bathroom.

“We started manufacturing brackets to custom specifications realizing over time there was a market for these solutions because no one else had a standardized product line,” he adds. “Consumers needed a bracket of some kind, but were limited in most instances to using brackets that weren’t aesthetically pleasing in a kitchen or didn’t have sufficient weight-bearing characteristics.”

Every builder knows that what's shown on a blueprint or in a 3-D rendering never exactly matches up with the end result. Something as small as a misaligned bolt could alter the placement of a support beam in a way that impacts how the structure fits together and its overall strength. Understanding those imperfections and having an accurate picture of the real-world building requires a way to map an as-built model of the structure.

When a developer evaluates land for a project, their first impulse might to be to take a drive to look at the site. But Nearmap US Inc.’s technology allows users to skip that step, as well as make other important decisions during every stage of a construction project, Vice President of Marketing Tony Agresta says.

PlanGrid is a field-focused mobile platform for coordinating construction documents that saves time and reduces rework.

By Tim O’Connor, Senior Editor at Knighthouse Media

Cost is a concern on any project, but when public money is involved there’s an even higher level of scrutiny. It’s one of the reasons why Caltrans, the agency charged with managing California’s highway systems, mandated that general contractor Granite Construction provide tablets to field workers during the realignment of SR-99 in Fresno, Calif. The $225 million project will make way for the construction of a high-speed rail line between San Francisco and Los Angeles.

Marretti Stairs’ distinctive staircases are growing more popular in America.

By Kat Zeman, Senior Editor at Knighthouse Media

It can cost as little as a few thousand dollars. Or it can cost a few hundred thousand dollars. Its price is influenced by design, material and special requests. Welcome to the world of Marretti Stairs, one of the world’s oldest manufacturers of custom-made staircases.

For more than 100 years, Florence, Italy-based Marretti Stairs has been handling jobs of all shapes and sizes. “We have staircases for every budget,” says Marzia Marzi, head of U.S. operations. “We can do a small staircase for $3,000 or we can do a very sophisticated design for $1 million.”

Marretti Stairs has been stepping up its game in the United States since it opened a New York office in 2005. It offers anything from cost-efficient simple designs to elaborate concepts that take months to engineer.

Keeping up with the latest drone technology helps VolAero best serve the construction and other industries. By Jim Harris, Senior Editor at Knighthouse Media

The use of commercial unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), or drones, has become common in the construction industry in recent years. For many construction companies and drone service providers, the biggest current question surrounding drones isn’t what they can do now, but what they will be able to do in the future.

“We’ve seen that over the last two to three years, drones have made a splash because of all the cool stuff they can do,” says Charles Zwebner, CEO and president of VolAero, a Miami-based drone services provider. “We’re now seeing the maturity of the drone; our clients are asking us where the yield is on this technology. There is always new technology and new software. It’s coming at breakneck speed.”

Ganter Interiors Inc. has long operated with the philosophy of keeping close to the client. “It was always important to keep the customer at the center of all endeavors,” COO Ronny Höhne says.

The New York City-based company applies that approach on its interior fit-out packages for general contractors, architects, developers and retailers. Ganter Interiors’ offerings range from design engineering to purchasing and manufacturing to site management and final installation, he says.

The firm, which carries more than 20 years of industry experience, has completed work on customized high-end apartments, offices, luxury stores and restaurants with exclusive finishes. Ganter Interiors’ portfolio also includes furniture rollouts for international retail brands.

“The range of our work extends from customized furnishings and interior development right up to complex technical interior equipment and construction management,” Höhne says. “It is our job to transfer the idea of our clients into technical solutions made of wood, metal, glass and stone.”

Jonas Construction Software was founded 27 years ago with a vision to be more than a typical construction software company. The operation set out to build a better, fully integrated construction software solution that offers exactly what its clients need to succeed.

“The most valuable aspect of our software is that our solution is truly integrated and our development is done fully in-house,” Sales Manager Yana Tcharnaia says. “Our company doesn’t buy third-party systems and try to piece meal solutions together; we develop every module that we have in-house so there are no syncing issues and our clients truly get the value of integration. For this reason, all screens look the same, making it user-friendly and easy to learn.”